Listeners to the Jeff O'Neil Show on 99.3 The FOX (CFOX-FM) Tuesday were surprised to hear none other than Vancouver Mayor Sam Sullivan co-hosting the open-phones segment of the show and announcing an upcoming official proclamation that November 28 is AC/DC Day in Terminal City.

Introduced as Sam 'Frickin' Sullivan, the mayor opened the segment declaring that he is re-forming SPINAL CHORD, the band that first brought him into the public eye prior to his involvement in civic politics. He was joking -- "maybe."

"I said it tongue-in-cheek to some of the interviewers on the radio," he told The Province later. "But, hey, why not?"

Led Zeppelin, Whitesnake, Paul Stanley, Ozzy Osbourne and Foo Fighters amongst others were all honoured at the Classic Rock awards last night. Led Zeppelin were presented the award of "Event Of The Year" for their reunion concert at London's 02 Arena which attracted over a million people applying for tickets.

Ozzy Osbourne also received braging rights as he was crowned with the Living Legend Award by ex- Guns N Roses/Velvet Revolver guitarist Slash.

AC/DC picked up the award for DVD Of The Year with their latest home video release "Plug Me In"

Whitesnake were able to pick the award for Best Album with their latest album, "Good To Be Bad" and KISS frontman Paul Stanley was presented Showman Of The Year award.

A short video about Ozzy Osbourne receiving the Living Legend award can be viewed below. More...

AC/DC's back catalog has benefited from the No. 1 debut of the Australian rock band's first album in eight years.

"Black Ice" sold 784,000 copies in the week ended October 26, while AC/DC's older titles moved a total of 92,000 copies.

"Back In Black," the band's massive 1980 album, sold 21,000 copies last week, up from 9,000 the week before, Nielsen SoundScan said Wednesday. The album is the fifth-biggest seller of all time in the United States, according to the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), with sales to date of 22 million copies. "High Voltage," the band's 1976 U.S. debut, rocketed to 11,000 copies from 4,000.

AC/DC made their new album, Black Ice, available only at Wal-Mart and through their website, but that hasn't limited its success: The CD not only has topped the charts in more than two dozen countries, it debuts atop the latest U.S. album chart with sales of more than 780,000 copies."It's overwhelming, and quite hard to take in," the legendary group's lead singer, Brian Johnson, said Wednesday after learning his group had 2008's second-biggest album debut.

"Even an old dog like me has a few more surprises in life, I guess," he said, chuckling. More...

AC/DC's pattern of success shows no sign of stopping as their new studio album, "Black Ice" has debuted at the Number One spot in twenty nine countries. The album has claimed the coveted spot in countries such as the United States, United Kingdom, Japan, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, Finland, Sweden, Italy, Belgium and many more. They are expected to sell ten million copies this year alone.

Last night, AC/DC opened the doors of their final dress rehearsal at Wilkes-Barre, PA's Wachovia Arena to contest winners from across the map, with fans traveling from as far as Scotland, the Czech Republic, Japan and beyond to see the band on the eve of their Black Ice World Tour.

Behind the back-drop of a giant train careening off track, the band roared onto the stage performing their new song, "Rock N' Roll Train" to the applause of an instantly charged audience. From there, the band whipped through decades of classic songs before returning to Black Ice with a stomping work-out of the album's title track. As the last notes of "Black Ice" wound-down, an oversize blow-up Rosie began to inflate, straddling the prop train and tapping her foot to the band's high-powered performance of "Whole Lotta Rosie" at full swell. After lighting the arena with his guitar pyrotechnics during "Let There Be Rock," Angus and the band retreated as the lights dimmed. Chants from the crowd accompanied the band's return to the stage for a two song encore, which ended with repeated cannon bursts as AC/DC closed out the night with a electric performance of "For Those About To Rock".

Smoke from the stage cannons lingered in halls of the Wachovia Arena long after the band's fans, piling into the cars and the fleet of buses that had caravanned them to the show, hit the highway to home.

With just a few days left until the release of AC/DC's first album in over eight years, the band has posted the album in full online for streaming at AC/DC 101 on their official website. The album, which will be released exclusively through Wal-mart stores only, is set to be released on October 20th, 2008. AC/DC has also announced some additional US tour dates which are listed below. More...

Stores across Australia have broken the embargo for Black Ice and started selling the album early. Despite the official release date being tomorrow (October 18), Black Ice is being sold now by just about every store that has it.

One retailer told Undercover, “we don’t care about embargos and the fans don’t care about charts. We are here to sell music and the fans are here to buy it. I couldn’t care less if Sony has an embargo on it until tomorrow. My customers want it today and I’m giving it to them”. More...

VH1 Classic commemorates AC/DC, who is returning after eight years with a new album, "Black Ice," with a 24-hour marathon on Sunday, October 19. Here's the lineup:

"Classic in Concert: No Bull" Airs at 4:00 PM ET/PT"No Bull" was designed to capture the over-the-top spectacle that was the 1996 "Ballbreaker" tour.

"BBC Crown Jewels: Rock Goes To College: AC/DC" Airs at 6:00 PM ET/PT"Rock Goes To College," was a BBC series that ran between 1978 and 1981 on British television.

"AC/DC Video Marathon" Airs at 7:00 PM ET/PT

"Classic in Concert: Live At Donnington" Airs at 8:00 PM ET/PTThis historic concert sees Angus Young and the boys hit the stage and wow a sizeable crowd at the 1991's Monsters of Rock show at Castle Donnington.

Additionally, VH1Classic.com will be home to exclusive online music and video content. Starting October 13 - October 20 VH1.com's and VH1Classic.com's The Leak will stream AC/DC's Black Ice a week before going on sale.

AC/DC frontman, Brian Johnson has recently spoke about the bands controversial decision to release their new studioalbum, "Black Ice" exclusively through Wal-Mart stores in North America.

"Maybe I'm just being old fashioned, but this iTunes, God bless 'em, it's going to kill music if they're not careful," 61-year-old singer Brian Johnson told Reuters. "It's a monster, this thing. It just worries me. And I'm sure they're just doing it all in the interest of making as much cash as possible. Let's put it this way, it's certainly not for the love, let's get that out of the way, right away."

Johnson also pointed out that Wal-Mart has been very loyal to AC/DC over the years, so the band had no problem giving the retailer an exclusive. "A lot of people were saying 'Ah man, you're going to the big Wal-Mart, you're selling out,'" Johnson said. "Wal-Mart were the only big store to stock all of our albums, every single one of them, and they've never deviated. And they sold AC/DC shirts and pajamas for kids, which we thought was really cool."

The long awaited new studio album from AC/DC – Black Ice will be released on Monday 20 October and is the first full-length studio album of all-new material since the release of Stiff Upper Lip in 2000.

The album is also the band's debut recording for Columbia Records. Produced by Brendan O'Brien at the Warehouse Studio in Vancouver, Black Ice premieres 15 new AC/DC compositions and performances including the album's first single, 'Rock 'N' Roll Train'. In support of Black Ice, AC/DC will embark on a major world tour, the group's first since 2001, beginning in late October and hitting the UK in early 2009. More...

Rock legends AC/DC will be holding listening parties for their brand new album, "Black Ice" on October 16th in all four Hard Rock Cafe's in Britain. They will take place between seven and nine at night and will be held in London, Cardiff, Edinburgh and Manchester.

AC/DC has added a further sixteen shows to their North American tour which will now take them into 2009. The band will be touring in support of their brand new studio album, "Black Ice" which will hit shelves on October 20th. "Black Ice" will be the bands first studio album since 2000's "Stiff Upper Lip."

Beginning in November, video gamers around the world will get to experience what it's like to rock like AC/DC with the Rock Band exclusive release of AC/DC LIVE: Rock Band Track Pack. Created by Harmonix and MTV Games, AC/DC LIVE: Rock Band Track Pack marks the first time ever the band has offered an entire album for video game play.

AC/DC LIVE: Rock Band Track Pack will feature the master recordings from the best of the band's live performances specially remixed for Rock Band by Brendan Fraser, who mixed the band's forthcoming album, Black Ice, at the Warehouse Studio in Vancouver, BC. Players will be able rock-out to 18 of AC/DC's biggest hits, allowing for more than 99 minutes of game play for each instrument. Included are:

"Thunderstruck""Shoot To Thrill""Back in Black""Hell Ain't A Bad Place To Be""Heatseeker""Fire Your Guns""Jailbreak""The Jack""Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap""Moneytalks""Hells Bells""High Voltage""Whole Lotta Rosie""You Shook Me All Night Long""T.N.T.""Let There Be Rock""Highway To Hell""For Those About To Rock (We Salute You)" More...

Fans of AC/DC have prompted the Aussie rockers to add new shows in America after selling out a string of November and December concerts in record time.

The Vancouver, Canada opening night of the band's first world tour in eight years sold out in just four minutes and all other U.S. dates on the upcoming Black Ice trek are following suit.

Unprecedented fan response has prompted the rockers to add shows in Chicago, Los Angeles, and Oakland.

Blabbermouth.net reported that Chicago's Allstate Arena concert sold out in minutes on Saturday. A second show was added and that sold out over the weekend too. Both Madison Square Garden concerts in New York sold out in minutes.

Meanwhile, AC/DC fans in San Antonio, Texas bought more tickets in one day for AC/DC than for any other artist in the city's history, and tickets for the band's Rogers Center show in Toronto, Canada sold faster than any stadium concert in the venue's history.

AC/DC frontman Brian Johnson has made clear the reason why the band will not put their catalogue on iTunes.

"We don't make singles, we make albums," he told the Telegraph.

"We believe the songs on any of our albums belong together. If we were on iTunes, we know a certain percentage of people would only download two or three songs from the album. We don't think that represents us musically."

Guitarist Angus Young adds: "Since iTunes came into existence, we've actually increased our back catalogue sales without being on the site," he said. "We were sternly warned by our management team and our record label that the complete opposite would be the case."